This summer’s big sales events could offer some of the best bargains before the ongoing trade war threatens to scramble fall and winter shopping.
President Donald Trump’s pause on his sweeping global tariffs is set to expire Aug. 1. So without a flurry of trade deals with dozens of countries in the coming weeks, the import taxes are set to drive up the prices of numerous overseas goods for businesses and consumers alike.
In the meantime, major retailers are rolling out deep midseason discounts to keep customers spending despite widespread pessimism. Consumer sentiment has improved from its dismal levels months ago but remains sharply lower than this time last year. The promotions could run as much as 40% off during Home Depot’s 4th of July Sale (June 19-July 9), Target’s Circle Week (July 6-12) and Best Buy’s Black Friday in July Sale (July 7-13), and up to 50% off during Amazon Prime Day (July 8-11) and Walmart Deals (July 8-13).
What happens with prices after the summer sales events is anyone’s guess. Retail executives, including at Walmart, and major consumer brands have warned that tariff-fueled price increases are likely as the year wears on and the inventories they’ve built up dwindle. Some analysts are already seeing signs of those hikes picking up, particularly at department stores, CNBC reported last week.
To reduce some of the guesswork for shoppers, NBC News is tracking online price levels for dozens of items at Amazon, Walmart, Target, Best Buy and Home Depot to determine when and how much they may fluctuate throughout the rest of the year.
Rather than sweep up hundreds or thousands of items across these retailers’ sprawling e-commerce marketplaces, the tracker zeroes in on a basket of 230 items that tend to be purchased less frequently than, say, groceries or household staples. They range from appliances like dishwashers and toasters to jewelry, smartphones and running shoes.
The NBC News Price Tracker is powered by the e-commerce price-tracking platform Bright Data, which is monitoring 27 to 61 items for each of the five retailers.
The Price Tracker can’t identify what causes prices to rise or fall, so it’s impossible to determine whether any changes reflect retailers passing along tariff expenses to shoppers. But the tool can help consumers plan their purchases at a time when goods from certain countries, such as China, or with specific components, like steel or aluminum, are disproportionately subject to steeper levies.
The summer sales period offers something of a starting line, coinciding with broader trade policy changes and representing the last major discounting spree before back-to-school shopping around Labor Day, followed by early-bird holiday sales leading up to Black Friday.
Since Bright Data began tracking prices of 230 items for NBC News on March 2, about 29% of them saw price hikes, with an average increase of nearly 6%. Home Depot and Target saw the most price hikes, affecting 39% and 37%, respectively, of those tracked since March. And over roughly the last month, price increases have been more common than reductions: In all but one week since May 30, twice as many products increased in price than decreased across the four major retailers.
(A Home Depot spokesperson said the company hasn’t taken tariff-related pricing actions and attributed any price swings to routine promotional cycles. Target didn’t comment.)
So far, there are few signs of broad-based pricing changes that clearly correspond to tariff policy moves.
“It’s been hard to draw a line connecting the dots between things that have been said, things that are happening in the world, and certain items that we know are manufactured in those areas,” said Jennifer Burns, Bright Data’s director of public relations and communications.
But a few patterns are emerging in the run-up to this month’s discounting sprees:
- Kitchen appliances: It might not be the best time to make major upgrades in the kitchen. Prices on larger appliances like freezers, stoves and ovens are up, particularly at Home Depot, where 39% of the items we tracked increased in price. The highest individual price increase was 53.1% on a freezer and refrigerator unit. At Best Buy, prices took a sharp dive from mid-April to mid-June but have since rebounded to slightly above their springtime levels.
- Water bottles: The prices of three popular stainless-steel water bottles — by Hydro Flask, Stanley and Owala — are each ticking up at Amazon and Walmart, potentially a sign that the 25% tariff on global steel is having an impact. (Owala declined to comment; Hydro Flask and Stanley didn’t respond to requests for comment.)
- Electronics: Smartphones saw a sharp price spike, increasing by an average of 15% at Best Buy, but other gadgets such as speakers, headphones and accessories like charging docks stayed flat across the five retailers. (A Best Buy spokesperson said the retailer offers high-quality tech at a range of competitive price points that can fluctuate for reasons including sales, seasonality and device upgrade cycles.)
- Apparel: Clothing price changes vary by retailer. In May, Walmart warned shoppers could start seeing tariff-driven price hikes within weeks, and apparel is one of several areas where that may be happening. Of the six clothing items NBC News is tracking at Walmart, four saw price hikes — together rising by an average of more than 57% over the past month. Four of the six Walmart toys NBC News tracked got pricier, up 37% during the same period. At Amazon, by contrast, just one of seven toys saw price hikes, and all six apparel purchases held flat. (A Walmart spokesperson said the company aims to “keep prices as low as we can for as long as we can.” An Amazon spokesperson said the retailer offers industry-leading low prices across hundreds of millions of items and pointed to CEO Andy Jassy’s recent remarks on CNBC that the company has “so far not seen prices appreciably go up.”)
- Beauty and jewelry: These prices largely haven’t changed, despite 30% tariffs on goods imported from China, where many such products are made.
Economists warn that consumers haven’t felt the full weight of tariffs at checkout just yet.
“I expect the inflation associated with tariffs to be felt later this year,” the National Retail Federation’s chief economist, Jack Kleinhenz, said in a press release last month. “Consumers remain very price sensitive, and those costs are likely to weigh heavily on consumer budgets.”
But fluctuating prices aren’t expected to deter people from chasing summer deals. Adobe Analytics, which tracks e-commerce spending, projects consumers will shell out $23.8 billion online from Tuesday to Friday — up $9.6 billion from last year’s summer sales.
“You have some consumers who just see really strong deals, and that’s enticing enough for them to do that spontaneous purchasing,” said Vivek Pandya, lead digital analyst at Adobe. “You also have consumers who are cognizant of the broader pricing environment globally, and are kind of trying to stockpile goods in anticipation.”
